All the "Average at best, & Ho hummmer" reviews etc. euther you never saw Jerry or ..... Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you got 'til it's gone?

But kind of an average day for the Grateful Dead. China Doll and Brokendown Palace were very nice.

I was 4th row for this show, 17 yrs old, dosed out! Made a sign in art class that said "Lazy lightning- Double dose us with two lightning bolts in florescent paint."! Garcia saw it and sure as shit, they played it next song. Thanks Jerry***!

what a boring first set, total snooze fest.
extremely uneventful playing.
wake me up when it's over.

I'll tell you what all the fuss is...

THIS SHOW ROCKS!!!!!!

glad we can all have our own opinions, and seriously folks...this is a fantastic performance.

Scarlet/Fire, Truckin>smokestack jam>Sugar Magnolia, china doll, lazy lightning....

would have loved to be there....

surprised no one has mentioned the attempt to play smokestack lightnin out of truckin, as bobby and brent both are really pushing for it there.

5 stars...searing versions of several songs...

FYI ...That is a speaker (JBL 120) blowing up in the beginning of Half Step. Its cool how Jerry Seems to like the sounds coming out of the broken one until big steve changes it out.

Nice Show

Not actually very remarkable. The jam out of Truckin' is pretty interesting, but the rest of the show is standard at best. The recording is very clear, could maybe use some mellowing of the top end.

Excellent Half Step>Franklin's>Me and My Uncle,
Scarlet Begonias, China Doll and Brokedown. IMO best China Doll solo. However, 3/9 was tighter and more consistent.

This is the show I've listened to more than any other- I've had the 2nd set burned in my memory since the tapes first surfaced. I can't even comprehend how some commenter can call this an off night. Scarlet/Fire is the best one I have heard on tape or in person- and of course China Doll... brings a tear every time I listen. I was so lucky to grow up within 20 miles of MSG during this time!

Hah sounds like Ramrod dropped his dinner plate on Mickey's big ass space xylophone thingy during Half-Step

MSG rocked that night. This was my fourth Dead show, and the crowd was still buzzing from the night before (also worth downloading). Great Scarlet/Fire, especially the transition. First set had a really good LL/Supplication and Brown Eyed Women. Nice Suger Mag to close. My favorite tape is now a CD. God bless the Warlocks, thanks for all fun.

What better spot for a first show on the East Coast?
15 years old in NYC. First of many great NYC shows & first of many more underage drinks at that dive bar around the corner who's name I can never remember ??
Wish I could recall more of the show a bit better but China Doll & Brokedown were stellar and are still well remembered.
Could never thank my big bro enough for turning me on to the Dead & taking me to my first show.

A few flaws in passing, but what a Scarlet/Fire,
China Doll et al.
Great recording, too. Listening to it provokes
a remarkable altered state of consciousness.
Everything about this show and tape is evocative
of the LSD of the era - bright, spangly, smeary,
sharp-edged, dazzling, hyperkinetic, high-octane, exhausting

This was-SUNSHINE- just a great ole kickass show,rowdy-DAY- newyork crowd,everybody-DREAM- trippin!

There I was, 17 years old from the burbs of CT at my second show, sitting on a concrete bench getting my face painted dayglow as people walked by talking and offering this and that without moving there lips. I ended up biting down hard on a plain white sea

Just started the feed and the reverb box hit the floor. Reminded me of my '65 Rambler in the Mission.

Sounds Good 1/2 through.

Hey Topher04, you must have been standing next to me that night. I saw the Dead around ten times at MSG during the 80's, and this night's China Doll is the one song I remember best from ALL the shows I attended. It was a fantastic night and people were glowing after the show.

Strangest night of my life. I was with friends in a corporate box on Phil's side. We ate heartily from the fat side of a sheet. I was nearly dragged into the space of the Garden by the music. People stood near me to make sure I didn't fall out. I think I held my breath through the entire China Doll. I'm sure there were black sheets and bats swirling everywhere above the audience before the encores. After the show I was certain that the bar we sat in was flooded but I kept my feet above it all. I lost my plastic water bird whistle to a bus driver at Port Authority who wouldn't let me on while playing it. I panicked when the doors shut but held on until Providence RI where I got out in favor of hitchhiking the rest of the way home to Cape Cod where I realized that I just had to get to the next show. And so it began. Sorry I can't rate the show more objectively!

Jerry is having an off night, and the band isn't all that together -- especially compated to some of the really hot shows of the previous week, such as 3/5 and 3/9, the previous night.

First set it unremarkable. Deal is tepid. Jerry's voice is strained in places. He sounds tired and uninspired in Scarlet, playing chords instead of solo jamming. The transition jam to Fire just doesn't go anywhere. Fire itself has a few moments, but seems to go on forever without acheiving anything. There are some moments in elsewhere in the second set.

This is one of the best sounding audience incarnations. The Scarlet>Fire is meticulously well played with Jerry discovering a low riff on the theme and drilling it home deeply. The drums are particularly powerful and lead into a spacily beautiful Wheel. This is a super show all around. I give it 6 stars, and infinity for the 'x' factor fulfilled.

I was at this one and the night before. Cool format for second set: 2 Jerry's, 2 Bob's, etc. and one each for the encore. That set had no breaks. They skipped the Scarlet reprise to go into Lost Sailor. Nice Wheel into China Doll and good Truckin jam. Great to hear this one again.

this show seemed to go on forever, thats not a bad thing. Very enjoyable.

Peace

Half step was a disaster, while there is some hot stuff in setI especially Lazy Lightning, there are guitar / sound problems throughout and Jerry completely flubs the lyrics in fire much worse than usual,and it's pretty flat and uninspired to be honest until the end and thats only a half dozen hot licks - crowd is going bonkers the whole time but thats the way the Garden is even for a crap show.

You may not agree with the appraisal but just did not feel it here.

This is an amazing show all the way through. But the Fire on the Mountain is amazingly beautiful and exploratory. Jerry takes some Huge Turns after each verse including the last one. He searches for every possible sound that the Tiger is capable of making.
Insane melodic runs. Very passionate emotional Fire.
One of the top 5.This show is an all timer for sure.

but for the most part the quality is superb, the transistions to franklins from 1/2 step is really happy, but the first seemed to go on and on, by far the highlight ofr me is the scarlet fire phil is so ontime for the crossover, you really hear the garcia we all knew and love in theis show, i had a cassette of this show years ago i lent it to some loser, my bad! and he never gave it back, anyway great job on the update guys! its a classic

I was at this show. I remember China Doll so well. Jerry just pulls off the high notes and the audience was with him hoping he could do it. It was the begining of the end of the sweet Garcia voice as we knew it from the 70's, but the soul was still there. This was one of those shows that left everyone with a smile as they walked out of the Garden into the City.

Good sound here. It sounds like a stack of speakers falls in the beginning of Miss Half Step.